Fred Armisen Jens Hannemann Drum Sticks!

"Saturday Night Live" utility player Fred Armisen-- er, we mean legendary drummer Jens Hannemann-- is busy expanding his brand. After conquering the world of instructional DVDs, he now has his very own signature drumsticks. Featuring Hannemann's autograph in a bold red script, the Pro Mark sticks will be available soon in music shops and on the Drag City website. You can see these beauties from multiple angles by taking a gander right here.

Of course, Hannemann's calling card is the Complicated Drumming Technique DVD, and he has brought it back into the spotlight with a promotional clip featuring testimonials to its power from percussion colleagues like Glenn Kotche (Wilco), Torry Castellano (the Donnas), and Adrian Young (No Doubt).

Just check out these ringing endorsements:

"He's a bully. That's the only definition I can think of [for] him. He's a musical bully"

-Glenn Kotche

"It'd probably make you a worse drummer and... a worse person."

-Torry Castellano

Or just watch them for yourself:


Finally, Fred Armisen-- who is in no way related to Jens Hannemann-- is currently shooting a movie called Confessions of a Shopaholic in NYC. Right, because when we first saw "The Prince Show", we totally thought Armisen was perfect for a movie like this: "A college grad lands a job as a financial journalist in New York City to support her shopping addiction and falls for a wealthy entrepreneur."

Moby Issues Last Night This Week

On his new LP Last Night, Moby is looking to recreate the recent past. Writes the uppercase-averse producer/DJ/soundtracker of commerce on his website: "in making 'last night', i essentially tried to take a long 8 hour night out in new york city and condense it into a 65 minute long album."

Brushing the dandruff off your best shirt, waiting for an hour outside a bar, sucking down one too many Brooklyn Browns, and an afterparty at a taqueria: it's all here on Last Night, due from Mute tomorrow (April 1) in the U.S. and today digitally in the UK, with a UK physical release to follow May 12. Well, all that, and appearances from Grandmaster Caz of the legendary Cold Crush Brothers, Aynzli Jones, Sylvia of Brooklyn's Kudu, and Smokey and S.O. Simple from the 419 Squad.

Moby has been DJing around quite a bit of late, and he's got a gig lined up April 3 at Hiro Ballroom in NYC. [MORE...]

Liz Phair Reissues Exile in Guyville, Signs to ATO
Phair interviews John Cusack, Ira Glass, Steve Albini, Matador dudes for accompanying DVD

Yes, everything you've heard about Liz Phair's Exile in Guyville being one of the greatest albums of all time is true. The songs really do hit that hard. The lyrics really are that good. And the perspective of a smart woman navigating her way through the indie rock scene really is that necessary, even today.

Fifteen years after its Matador Records release in 1993, Exile in Guyville is getting the reissue celebration it deserves. On June 24, ATO Records will beef up the album with four bonus tracks from the original Guyville sessions as well as an accompanying DVD.

The bonus tracks: the solo cut "Ant in Alaska", a song inspired by the Troggs' "Wild Thing", the full band cut "Say You", and an untitled solo instrumental. "Ant in Alaska" and "Wild Thing" have both been previously attributed to Phair's notorious pre-Guyville "Girly Sound" demos.

The DVD: Guyville Redux, a documentary about the making of the album, with a focus on the indie scene in the Wicker Park neighborhood of Chicago, out of which Phair sprung in the early 90s. In the documentary, Phair herself interviews a series of luminaries connected to the scene, including radio/TV personality Ira Glass, actor John Cusack (whose role in High Fidelity pretty much epitomized the kind of guy Phair disses on Exile in Guyville), Steve Albini, Matador's Gerard Cosloy and Chris Lombardi, Guyville producer Brad Wood, members of Urge Overkill, and John Henderson of Chicago label Feel Good All Over.

And who do we have to thank for all of this Liz Phair goodness? Why, Dave Matthews, of course! Matthews is one of the co-founders of ATO Records, which in addition to putting out the reissue has signed Phair for a new studio album due in the fall. (Yes, she is no longer on Capitol Records.) AND Dave introduces the Guyville Redux DVD.

So between this, My Morning Jacket, and Radiohead, is it finally time to stop hating Dave Matthews? [MORE...]

Dinosaur Jr., Jarvis Cocker, Ghost and Rae, Mission of Burma to Play Pitchfork Music Festival
Plus: Dirty Projectors, Apples in Stereo, Cut Copy, Jay Reatard, and more!

The 2008 Pitchfork Music Festival invades Chicago's Union Park from July 18-20. We've already revealed 13 of the 41 scheduled acts-- including Public Enemy doing It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, Animal Collective, Spiritualized, and Vampire Weekend -- and now, we're pleased to announce 13 more.

On Friday night, the Pitchfork Music Festival and All Tomorrow's Parties present "Don't Look Back". Along with the previously announced performance by Public Enemy, Mission of Burma will play their just-reissued 1983 post-punk classic Vs.! A third "Don't Look Back" act will be added in the coming weeks.

Other additions to the lineup include the original lineup of the legendary Dinosaur Jr., Ghostface and Raekwon of the Wu-Tang Clan performing together, and Jarvis Cocker, who will be making his first Midwest appearance in more than 12 years.

Also set to appear: the Apples in Stereo, Dirty Projectors, Cut Copy, Jay Reatard, King Khan & His Shrines, Fuck Buttons, the Ruby Suns, A Hawk and a Hacksaw, and Chicago's own Occidental Brothers Dance Band International.

With those additions, the festival lineup to date is (latest additions starred):

Friday, July 18:
Pitchfork Music Festival and All Tomorrow's Parties present "Don't Look Back"

Public Enemy performing It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back
* Mission of Burma performing Vs. *
+ one more to be announced

Saturday, July 19:

Animal Collective
* Jarvis Cocker *
!!!
Vampire Weekend
Dizzee Rascal
Fleet Foxes
No Age
* Jay Reatard *
* King Khan & His Shrines *
Atlas Sound
* The Ruby Suns *
* A Hawk and a Hacksaw *
* Occidental Brothers Dance Band International *
+ many more!

Sunday, July 20:

* Dinosaur Jr. *
Spiritualized
M. Ward
* Ghostface and Raekwon *
* The Apples in Stereo *
Boris
* Dirty Projectors *
* Cut Copy *
Extra Golden
El Guincho
* Fuck Buttons *
+ many more!

And if all that onstage goodness isn't enough, the Pitchfork Music Festival is thrilled to announce that its new radio partner, KEXP, will broadcast live from Chicago in the days leading up to the festival. KEXP DJs John Richards and Cheryl Waters will do their shows from the festival grounds on Saturday and Sunday, and throughout the weekend KEXP will air select live festival performances.

Tickets for the 2008 Pitchfork Music Festival are on sale now. As in previous years, we've worked to ensure you get the most bang for your buck. Three-day passes run $65, two-day passes for Saturday and Sunday go for $50, and individual day passes can be yours for $30. If you like seeing awesome bands outdoors in the summertime in one of the world's great cities and don't want to spend a lot of money doing it, you can buy your tickets here.

Mark Kozelek Tours, Bundles Bonus CD With Book

The good news? Mark Kozelek is touring the U.S. and Japan over the next few months, which means all those ex-girlfriends of mine will get a chance to hear all those songs I put on all those damn mixtapes live and in person. The bad news? Before it even began, Mark had to cancel a date in Toronto. You win some, as they say, and you lose some; and if you didn't, well, you wouldn't have any lyrical fodder for Sun Kil Moon songs.

Sun Kil Moon songs like the ones on April, due Tuesday (April 1) on Mark's own Caldo Verde label.

Oh, and about the new edition of that Nights of Passed Over lyric book we mentioned some months back? Well, it, too, is out April 1. It's also limited to 2,500 copies, and it comes with a 12-song bonus CD called Nights LP. The disc sports rarities, live tracks, and assorted ephemera, including the live version of "Drop" recently featured in Forkcast. [MORE...]

Black Francis Readies Mini-Album
Also known as an EP

While we await the arrival of his Isaac Brock and Larry Norman-enhanced re-working of Lee Hazlewood's Trouble Is a Lonesome Town, Black Francis aka Frank Black aka Charles Thompson aka that guy in front of Pixies for a while there has assembled a collection of new solo material.

The Bluefinger follow-up is a mini-album called Svn Fngrs, and it comes out April 1 via Cooking Vinyl. Regarding the format, Black had this to say in a press release:

"There are seven songs clocking in at 20 minutes, and so I suppose it qualifies as a mini-LP under the old formats. No one seems to know or care what the current format models are (a very weakened LP on compact disc continues to rule the roost by default), which is WONDERFUL; so let's just call it music and pay whatever price your Google research turns up. If you want it for free, you can usually find some tracks for free download on my MySpace page or on my own blackfrancis.net."

Black also had an interesting note about the content of Svn Fngrs, saying, "The theme revolves around a lot of NASTY sex, NASTIER death, and beautifully strange birth."

The first Svn Fngrs song to hit the net (via an official YouTube video and the audio player on Black's website) is "I Sent Away". Cooking Vinyl, however, plans to release a "Charles Normal Re-mix" of Svn opener "The Seus" as a single. A video for that song is expected as well.

Black's only scheduled live date is an appearance at San Francisco's Castro Theatre on April 25. [MORE...]

Prince Paul, Chali 2na Are Rapping Baby Dinosaurs
As are Scratch of the Roots, Wordsworth of eMC, and Ladybug Mecca of Digable Planets

Since grown-up rap can and does contain adult themes and situations-- and since actual child rappers have begun to conflate beloved superheroes with the degradation of naptime-- the world is crying out for a crew of child-appropriate rhyming cartoon dinosaurs. (Wait, we are?)

Apparently so! Thus, the Dino 5 were born. Yes, the Dino 5, featuring the mic skills of DJ Stegosaurus, MC T-Rex, Teo Pterodactyl, Tracy Triceratops, and Billy Brontosaurus, voiced by Prince Paul, Chali 2na of the late Jurassic 5, Scratch of the Roots, Ladybug Mecca of Digable Planets, and Wordsworth of eMC. Well done, all! Your cred with that vital 0-4 demographic is now ensured.

The Dino 5 will issue Baby Loves Hip-Hop April 1 on the Baby Loves Music imprint. It's the perfect gift for the baby in your life, or, you know, potheads. Sample lyric: "I like stuffed animals like my friend Bunny/ I like soccer games and jokes that are funny."

After pointing out that the Dino 5 project has already been optioned for a television program, the Baby Loves Music website refers to the album as "Three Feet High and Rising for the next generation." Please, children, keep your grubby mits off my Enter the Wu-Tang.

A Place to Bury Strangers Issue 7" Box Set, Tour UK

What in the hell is all that racket? Why, it's my brand new Vacancy Records-issued limited edition box set of three A Place to Bury Strangers 7"s! I mean, what else could it be?

That's right, another nifty little vinyl rarity from the Brooklyn sound-bombers is just waiting for your clicks right this very instant. Vacancy are crafting 500 sets of 7"s for three AP2BS favorites, backed with a trio of previously unreleased jams. Crafting very, very, slowly, it should be noted, as every one of these sets features hand screen-painted artwork by the band and Vacancy's Louise Fenton.

The sets are available for purchase on Vacancy's MySpace right this instant, though you're warned not to expect to receive 'em for a couple months yet.

Before the packages gets shipped, A Place to Bury Strangers have a handful of East Coast dates in early April, and their first-ever UK tour in May, including a stop at the recently sold-out ATP vs. Pitchfork festival. [MORE...]

DJ Shadow & Cut Chemist Bring "Hard Sell" to DVD
Add dates

With just one date left on the European leg of their "Hard Sell" tour, DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist have kept their beatmatching partnership alive with the announcement of a handful of Australian dates in April, as well as a couple of North American festival dates in July.

Unfortunately, live shows just don't last, unless they're recorded in one medium or another. Fortunately, Shadow and Chemist have documented the final installment of the so-called "Brainfreeze trilogy" (the other two being Brainfreeze and Product Placement) in long-lasting CD and DVD format, out now.

Featured on the Hard Sell at the Hollywood Bowl DVD is the duo's complete "Hard Sell" performance at the titular venue, exclusive interviews with both DJs, behind-the-scenes footage documenting how the show came together, a bonus featurette called Live in Arcata, and a 40-page booklet with photos and an essay. From the looks of things, this is Alive 2007 for hip-hop heads, except on DVD.

The CD, The Hard Sell (Encore), is a brand new version of the previously released (and now sold out) Hard Sell CD, recorded after the Hollywood Bowl gig (so it's not exactly a live document, sorry). According to DJ Shadow's web store, Encore "includes much of the material the duo had to scrap due to time constraints at the Bowl...and also a few routines deemed too complicated to attempt at the time!" [MORE...]

Apples in Stereo Compile B-sides, Rarities on Projects
Including "Colbert Report" jam!

Slick-pop aficionados the Apples in Stereo will release a collection of B-sides and rarities called Electronic Projects for Musicians on April 1 via Simian/Yep Roc/Elephant 6. Technically the follow-up to last year's New Magnetic Wonder, the compilation's curatorial spirit makes it more of a sequel to 1996's Science Faire.

Among Projects' treasures is "Stephen Stephen", the tune Apples frontman Robert Schneider performed for Stephen Colbert on "The Colbert Report" amid that Decemberists challenge hysteria a couple winters back.

The live landscape is fairly bare for the Apples, but their one scheduled date is a good one. It happens to be a just-announced July 20 appearance at this year's Pitchfork Music Festival. [MORE...]

No Age, Sunset Rubdown, Casiotone in 7" Series
Plus: Miko Miko, Abe Vigoda, Parenthetical Girls

David Horvitz knows him some bands. And the dude behind the Xiu Xiu and Sunset Rubdown Polaroid projects has assembled a smattering of these music-makers for a new parade of subscription-based seven-inches.

No Age, Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, Mika Miko, Abe Vigoda (the band, not the actor), Parenthetical Girls, and the aforementioned Sunset Rubdown will partake of the "David Horvitz 7" Picture Disc Series", which has its home on Brooklyn's Aagoo Records.

In addition to music (check out the tracklists for the first two singles below), each picture disc, being a picture disc, will feature, yes, a picture. The photos in question were taken by Horvitz himself, and indeed that's a Horvitz portrait of Casiotone's Owen Ashworth up there, looking all painfully alone on his celly.

"Now wait a minute!" you say. "A Casiotone picture disc with a David Horvitz photo? That sounds awfully familiar..." And you'd be right. This particular Casiotone release was originally discussed in these pages a few months ago. Good eye, my friend.

Each 7" in the bi-monthly series is limited to 500 copies, with a portion of that number allotted for subscribers, and the rest available in select stores and at merch tables. The Casiotone offering is out now, with Parenthetical Girls following in May, Abe Vigoda in July, Mika Miko in September, Sunset Rubdown in November, and No Age in January 2009. Viva la 7"! [MORE...]

M83 and Maps Remix Each Other on New Single

M83's sweeping synth sounds are like the audio equivalent of a moving landscape, so what better way to herald the release of new album Saturdays = Youth than with a sky-themed single?

Preceding Saturdays' arrival via Mute (April 15 in North America, April 14 everywhere else) is a split single with M83 and fellow skygazers Maps remixing each other's work. One side features the "M83 Mix" of Maps' "To the Sky" (from last year's We Can Create), while the other features the "Maps Mix" of M83's "We Own the Sky", a track from the new LP. The single is a limited edition 7" available online and at select UK independent stores on April 7 thanks to Sonic Cathedral.

Following its release, Anthony Gonzalez has plenty of M83 dates to worry about, so support for the single will fall to Maps' James Chapman. On April 30, Chapman will DJ for Sonic Cathedral at the Social in London. Also on the bill are Ulrich Schnauss, Airiel, and Autumn Chorus. [MORE...]

Do you have a news tip for us? Anything crazy happen at a show you attended recently? Do you have inside info on the bands we cover? Is one of your favorite artists (that's not somebody you know personally) releasing a new record you'd like to see covered? You will remain completely anonymous, unless we are given your express permission to reveal your identity. (Please note that publicists, managers, booking agents, and other artist representatives are generally exempt from this rule, but will also be granted anonymity if requested.)